“Free Lunch,” a short story from Wilmington writer Karen E. Bender’s collection “Refund,” is being featured this week on Storyville, the literary app.

Launched in 2010, Storyville is a subscription app that posts stories on Kindle, iPhones and iPads. Each week, the app serves up a different story — some classics, many by contemporary writers.

A Los Angeles native who’s lived in the Wilmington area for more than a decade, Bender has had short fiction appear in The New Yorker, Ploughshares, Zoetrope, Story, Narrative and many other publications. She is the author of the novels “Like Normal People” and “A Town of Empty Rooms.”

About This Blog

This is an emporium for all things literary: occasional book reviews, local book news, items about authors (mostly from the Cape Fear area but occasional visitors) and miscellaneous rants.

The usual author is Ben Steelman, feature writer and book columnist for the Star-News. He’s that shaggy, slightly smelly character you spot lurking in the back aisles of your local bookstore. Physically, he has more than a passing resemblance to Ignatius J. Reilly, hero of John Kennedy Toole’s “A Confederacy of Dunces” — some observers have noted other parallels as well.